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Abstract

Accelerated degradation of the wetlands and fragmentation of surrounding vegetation in the Andean-Orinoco Piedmont are the main threats to diversity and ecological integrity of these ecosystems; however, information on this topic is of limited availability. In this region, we evaluated the value of 37 lentic wetlands as reservoirs of woody and aquatic plants and, analyzed diversity and changes in species composition within and among groups defined according to management given by: 1) type (swamps, heronries, rice fields, semi-natural lakes, constructed lakes and fish farms) and, 2) origins (natural, mixed and artificial). A total of 506 plant species were recorded: 80% woody and 20% aquatic. Of these, 411 species (81%) were considered species typical of the area (Meta Piedmont distribution). Diversity patterns seem to be driven by high landscape heterogeneity and wetland management. The fish farms presented the highest diversity of woody plants, while swamps ranked highest for aquatic plant diversity. Regarding wetland origin, the artificial systems were the most diverse, but natural wetlands presented the highest diversity of typical species and can therefore be considered representative ecosystems at the regional scale. Our results suggest that lentic wetlands act as refuges for native vegetation of Meta Piedmont forest, hosting 55% of the woody of Piedmont species and 29% of the aquatic species of Orinoco basin. The wetlands showed a high species turnover and the results indicated that small wetlands (mean±SD: size = 11±18.7 ha), with a small area of surrounding forest (10±8.6 ha) supported high local and regional plant diversity. To ensure long-term conservation of lentic wetlands, it is necessary to develop management and conservation strategies that take both natural and created wetlands into account.

Author Comment

This is a submission to PeerJ for review.

Supplemental Information

(Ĉm is expressed as a percentage of completeness, values from 0 represent no completeness and values of 100 maximum completeness based on Chao & Jost (2012) . *only one single individual was found in this wetland, and it was excluded from the RLI analysis; -: in this wetland no plants in this formation were found during sample).

Total (α) and mean (ᾱ ± SD) alpha diversity, and range values of richness (0D) and dominant species (2D) of woody and aquatics plants in wetland types and origins

Compositional similarity (CS) of richness (0D) and dominant species (2D) of woody and aquatic plants

Additional Information

Competing Interests

Francisco Castro is a botanist and independent researcher, which participated in this work as co-author of active form and he does not have conflict in the publication of this manuscript. The authors declare that they have no competing interests.

Author Contributions

Johanna I. Murillo-Pacheco conceived and designed the experiments, performed the experiments, analyzed the data, contributed reagents/materials/analysis tools, wrote the paper, prepared figures and/or tables, reviewed drafts of the paper.

Federico Escobar conceived and designed the experiments, analyzed the data, contributed reagents/materials/analysis tools, wrote the paper, prepared figures and/or tables, reviewed drafts of the paper.

Francisco Castro-Lima performed the experiments, contributed reagents/materials/analysis tools, wrote the paper, reviewed drafts of the paper.

José R Verdú conceived and designed the experiments, wrote the paper, reviewed drafts of the paper.

Germán M López-Iborra conceived and designed the experiments, wrote the paper, reviewed drafts of the paper.

Data Deposition

The following information was supplied regarding data availability:

Table S1. https://figshare.com/s/e265c23a9171c68e1ab2

DOI 10.6084/m9.figshare.3180961

Table S2. https://figshare.com/s/4b9e4e06ed8d108cdd5e

DOI 10.6084/m9.figshare.3180985

Table S3.

https://figshare.com/s/7974fc8c3e9e2046da9a

DOI 10.6084/m9.figshare.3181000

Table S4.https://figshare.com/s/513f4b9de2a74e17aaad

DOI 10.6084/m9.figshare.3181003

Funding

This research was supported by J.M.P. fellowships funded by Departamento Administrativo de Ciencia, Tecnología e Innovación (COLCIENCIAS) through its Créditos Condonables para Estudios de Doctorado en el Exterior program (512/ 2010), also crédito-beca of Fundación Carolina-Colfuturo (2008) and funding of Alianza Pacifico – AMEXCID (2015) to research fellowship in Instituto de Ecología A. C. The funding for fieldwork was obtained from Ramsar Convention (WWF/09/CO/5), Corporación KOTSALA and equipment sponsored by IdeaWild (2014). The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.

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